


5 things

by ihaveacleverfandomurl



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: 5+1 Things, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, During Canon, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Panic Attacks
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-03
Updated: 2021-02-22
Packaged: 2021-03-08 04:34:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26769580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ihaveacleverfandomurl/pseuds/ihaveacleverfandomurl
Summary: Sometimes, Neil Josten counting Kevin through a panic attack stitches him back together.
Relationships: Kevin Day/Neil Josten
Comments: 36
Kudos: 116





	1. [the court]

**Author's Note:**

> general cw for whole fic: panic attacks in EVERY CHAPTER, discussions of Kevin’s abuse, scars, injury, trauma  
> where the fUCK is more kevineil? i guess i have to do it myself with some,,, “canon? don’t know her” fic where i pick and choose what gets to stay with extreme arbitrariness  
> anyway if ur lookin for healthy knowledge of how to deal with panic attacks in this fic neither kevin nor neil really knows shit and idk either,,,, coping with mental illnesses? not my strong suit

[the court]

Andrew had gotten bored and gone outside to smoke when it first happened.

Kevin was hours into a solo night practice he probably should have cut shorter. Hours into working the hand his physical therapist still cautioned him against using as hard as he wanted to. And he was being careful. But even being careful wasn’t enough.

He didn’t register the first words spoken to him. He couldn’t drag his eyes from his trembling, scarred left hand, couldn’t pull enough oxygen into his lungs.

He’d dropped it. The Exy racquet. He’d tried to make a shot — something that should have been the easiest thing in the world, second nature, what he’d trained his entire life to do — but his hand, the fucking useless thing, spasmed. And the racquet went flying.

He couldn’t do it.

He was a failure.

“Hey. _Look at me_.”

The hand that covered his own did not, surprisingly, belong to Kevin’s ever-present guard. He followed the gray sweatshirt sleeve up to the new striker’s face — Neil Josten.

Neil was crouched in front of him, dressed for bed aside from a pair of beat up running shoes — in such bad shape that it was a miracle they hadn’t fallen apart yet.

Kevin didn’t know why Neil, of all people, was here. His presence was contextless and strange, in the middle of the night, in the middle of the court, and it started to pull Kevin out of churning panic to ask in a raw voice, “What?”

“Breathe in,” Neil said, with narrowed eyes, and Kevin half did, covered his face with his right hand, coughed out the half breath, tried again.

He reached to scrabble at his chest, like he could clear the blockage of his own mind, and Neil’s hand went with his own.

“Come on. Five things you can see,” Neil said.

“What,” Kevin rasped again.

“Give me five things you can see.” A tinge of impatience. Kevin might have been actually pissed about it if it wasn’t another thread of a grounding influence. It was what they did on the court, him and Neil. They clashed and fought and worked, for Exy’s sake.

“My racquet,” Kevin mumbled, felt his face twist as he stared at the netting lying there where it had fallen.

Neil’s hand tightened on him. “Another.”

Kevin let his eyes trail away. “The ball.”

Neil nodded for more.

“A cone,” Kevin said. “The goal.” Finally, his eyes falling on the man in front of him, he croaked, “You.”

Neil’s steady gaze skittered away.

Kevin asked, “What are you doing here?”

“Count four things you can touch,” Neil prompted. He squeezed again, jaw set as Kevin blinked at him, keeping the pressure until Kevin dubiously started listing off again.

_His knees on the court floor, his shirt sticking to his back, his hair in his eyes._

_Neil gripping his hand._

“I went for a run,” Neil rewarded him with quietly. “Ended up here. Focus. What are three things you can hear?”

_Kevin’s own breath. Neil’s breath. The hum of the building and its lights and its air and its emptiness, except for them._

“Two things you smell.”

Kevin wrinkled his nose because, very clearly, _sweat_ was one of them, and a hint of Neil’s smile cracked through when Kevin said so. “And?”

“Don’t know,” Kevin said. He couldn’t smell much of anything. Sniffed again, followed his nose to lean in closer to Neil. “Laundry detergent?”

Neil shifted back, ducking away, his fingers withdrawing from Kevin’s. “One more. One taste.”

“I don’t know,” Kevin repeated, feeling irritated for absolutely no reason. “I just want to brush my teeth.”

Neil nodded, standing up and finally looking at him again. “Better?”

“Yes,” Kevin admitted. Looked down at his hand. Not shaking, not aching anymore. “Where did you learn that?”

“My mo —”

He cut himself off, and Kevin looked up to find him frozen in place, hand to his mouth.

“Your what?”

“Nothing,” Neil said, too quick. Too sharp. He turned away, pressed the heels of his palms into his eyes. “I just had to find ways to ward off panic attacks sometimes. Don’t worry about it.”

“Neil,” Kevin called as Neil headed for the door. “Don’t think this lets you off the hook.”

Neil twitched, shoulders hitching, his hand holding the plexiglass open for his escape.

“Come back tomorrow night and practice with me.”

At that, Neil actually turned, eyes darting back to Kevin.

“Maybe we can actually get you halfway to where you need to be.”

The strange fear on Neil’s face melted into a wry glare, and he flipped Kevin off as he let the court door fall shut behind him, setting off at a run towards the lockers — and the exit.

Kevin watched him go, flexed his hand. He wasn’t sure why the air felt so heavy, like something had happened with Neil that Kevin couldn’t parse.

It was just a moment of team-building with a troublesome striker, right?

* * *

“Neil was the one running out like the building was on fire earlier, wasn’t he?” Andrew said later, as they drove back to the dorms. Unprompted.

Kevin looked at him in surprise. Andrew was never one for talk at night, off his meds. “Yeah.”

Andrew’s gaze was hard as he stared at the dark road. “I don’t trust him.”

Kevin laced his fingers together in his lap and thought that maybe he should agree. Neil was new and untested and endlessly a thorn in Kevin’s side at practices. But as he thought about Neil counting him down to regrouping his panic-scattered brain, he couldn’t really bring himself to say anything as Andrew drove on.


	2. [the apartment]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: the usual, alcohol abuse  
> love writing for an audience of 3 as a multishipper ;)

[the apartment]

“They’re here,” Wymack said. “The Ravens are transferring to our district.”

Kevin’s world narrowed to terror and a stark black number one on a cheekbone. He was faintly aware of Wymack’s hands at his collar, his body crushing Kevin’s against the wall, because Kevin’s legs couldn’t hold him up anymore. He’d knocked several somethings over in his stumbling shove backwards. The world came in flashes.

He was shouting, and so was Wymack.

“Look at me. Look at me, god damn you, and breathe.”

Kevin couldn’t breathe. Kevin couldn’t think. He had to go back, or they were all fucked, or Riko would break more than his hand.

He had to call. Had to know. For sure.

Jean’s voice on Wymack’s phone yanked the floor from beneath him with the finality of, “ _c’est vrai,_ ” murmured into his ear.

* * *

Kevin didn’t think trying to get to the court in his state was smart, but an hour of staring into space and wishing he could cope with Exy instead of alcohol had him standing up to pace, blinking away an unsteady rush. He needed to move somehow.

“For god’s sake, Kevin,” Wymack said when Kevin paced by his office for the fifth time. “Go wear out the stairs for a while. On the ground floor, because if you fall and break your neck, I’m not explaining that to Andrew.”

“Yeah,” Kevin mumbled, took a last swig. Wiped his mouth with his hand, felt the drag of raised scar tissue across his mouth.

The stairs wavered and he had to hold onto the railing as he slowly descended, but it was cooler in the empty hallways than it had been in Wymack’s apartment — a step towards trying to clear his head. Kevin had to pause on the second floor landing when nausea hit him, and pause again when his eyes fell on a pair of legs stretched out on the concrete at the bottom of the stairs. He knew those shoes. He’d seen those shoes yesterday.

“Neil?” he swallowed, stumbled down to the ground floor.

Neil startled at the sight of him, drawing up his legs. He was breathing hard, dark hair plastered to his forehead — clearly having just run here.

Kevin’s barely-together façade would have cracked at one glance from Andrew right now. But maybe he could hold it together for Neil.

Aside from the fact that he was…well…very clearly inebriated at three in the afternoon.

“Ah. Sorry. I didn’t…” Neil pressed his forehead to his knees and gulped air. “Was just…taking a break.”

“Don’t let me stop you,” Kevin mumbled, but his standing there felt so awkward that he forced himself back into pacing, climbing back up the stairs and down again.

Neil watched him, his eyes an uncomfortable prickle on Kevin’s back, and finally said, “We’re not practicing tonight, are we? Do you need me to count you down?”

Kevin halted halfway up the steps, tilted back a little too far, stumbled back a few as he fought to hold tight onto the railing. Neil’s hand on his back steadied him, and he managed, “Yeah.”

Five things he saw: _the stairs, the railing, the flickering naked lightbulb at the top of the stairwell_ (he leaned back too far again to see that and had to turn around to sit down before he fully fell over) _,_ _the empty coffee cup sleeve lying abandoned at the foot of the stairs…those stupid fucking running shoes that Neil should throw out._

Neil snorted and shoved at his shoulder.

Four things he felt: _the stairs underneath him, his own shoes on his feet_ (half tied, maybe he was luckier for not falling over than he thought) _, his shirt sleeves rolled up around his elbows and beginning to slip down, dizzy dizzy dizzy…_

“Touch,” Neil reminded him. “Four things you can touch.”

Kevin glared up at Neil, towering over Kevin for once, and no longer touching him. He simply didn’t have a fourth thing. “I don’t know.”

Neil quirked an annoying eyebrow in that annoying way and narrowed his eyes. Again, annoyingly. “I’m sure you can figure it out.”

“I thought you were supposed to be quiet,” was out of Kevin’s mouth before he could stop it. “But I guess Andrew wouldn’t care about what was up with you if you were.”

Neil’s face shuttered. “What?”

“Nothing. Give me the next one.”

“Three things you can hear,” Neil bit out, and his arms were folded with his hands fisted in the fabric of his own sleeves, shoulders to his ears. Eyes wide and fearful and brown and — it didn’t feel right, that they were brown. Another wave of nausea hit Kevin, but it brought with it a strange prickle of déjà vu this time. It wasn’t from the night before, when Neil had adopted this same look, but something…further back…something not-quite-but-almost the same…

He chewed on the inside of his cheek and fought and failed not to stare. “I feel like I know…I know you from…”

“I’ll give you one,” said Neil harshly. “We’re both listening to you spout bullshit because you’re drunk and scared about the Ravens.”

Kevin felt the air rush out of him again, and he slumped back fully against the stairs. “You know.”

“I heard part of it,” Neil admitted. “Coach filled in the rest.”

Kevin didn’t notice the tremors beginning to run through his frame until Neil reached out again to steady him. “But you’re staying here. You have a contract. And…” Neil’s voice held a curious undertone of bitterness. “A deal.”

Andrew. Yes. Andrew said he’d protect him. But…

“He’s not here,” Kevin said, and could feel himself beginning to shake again. “Andrew isn’t here.”

“Well, neither is Riko.” The sneer creeping across Neil’s face was familiar, too, and Kevin scrambled to gather threads of memory. Neil’s voice broke his concentration. “You’re a Fox. They can’t take you away from us, no matter how hard they try.”

_Three things he could hear: Neil, Neil, Neil._


	3. [interlude — the club]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Neil knew how to count Kevin down for a reason. Maybe it was time Kevin returned the favor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: the usual, nonconsensual drugging, alcohol & drug use  
> Happy 2021 hope my brain lets me write this year~

[interlude — the club]

Neil was mad at him, for some reason. Had been since that day at Wymack’s apartment. He hadn’t so much as glanced at Kevin when he’d come out of his room with his brand new club clothes, hadn’t met Kevin’s gaze when they’d been shoved into the Sweetie’s booth (cramped, with one more body than usual), hadn’t even acknowledged him when they clustered close, elbow to elbow, around a table at Eden’s Twilight — sans Andrew, who’d disappeared for the bar to gather drinks for them all.

“Neil,” Kevin said, quietly enough that the music and chatter drowned him out to all but the man next to him, who twitched.

“What.”

Kevin didn’t know exactly what to say. What, indeed? Neil had counted him through two panic attacks and now Kevin felt entitled to more than simply his game?

“Look at me,” he finally said. And finally, Neil did.

Kevin didn’t know what it was about Neil’s eyes suddenly that had him frozen to the spot, a spill of that déjà vu, what drew an aborted reach out to touch.

Neil flinched and dropped his gaze and said again, “ _ What? _ ”

“Why do you wear —”

“A drink. To our shiny new striker.” Andrew had appeared at the table, pressed Kevin’s usual into his hand and dropped a glass in front of Neil.

Kevin stared at the glass.

“I don’t do alcohol,” Neil said coldly.

“So you’ve said. Lucky for you, it’s cola.” Andrew’s expression was blank, wiped entirely free of his drugged smile by now, but his eyes glittered.

They didn’t bring new recruits to Columbia to make merry with them. Kevin doubted it was just cola. Neil did too, judging by how carefully he picked up and eyed the glass, swirling its contents.

“I’m not thirsty,” he announced.

“Humor me,” said Andrew, and it wasn’t an invitation.

Kevin watched with trepidation as Neil glared, stared down at his drink again, and finally raised it to his lips. The sip was small, and his eyes were narrowed, trained on Andrew.

It wasn’t spiked, apparently. Neil’s brow smoothed, and he drank more deeply.

Kevin didn’t realize everyone else was silently toasting and drinking too until Neil’s gaze fastened on him again, with a questioning lift of his eyebrow. Kevin downed his drink, ignoring the burn, and held out a hand when Aaron extracted cracker packets from his pocket.

Neil’s look was distinctly disapproving when Kevin tossed back the cracker dust, and when Andrew passed shots around the table, he was still watching Kevin tear open another packet.

The shots were taken as one, but nobody missed Neil’s violent reaction to his own soda shot, grabbing at the table and then for Andrew, but Andrew moved quicker.

Kevin watched, mouth dry, as Andrew yanked Neil close — checking if the dust had hit. It was part of what they did, their little group, and Neil had been luckier than past participants, with only dust and nothing else.

But as Neil swayed, released from Andrew’s grip, as he went down with Aaron’s pull of his chair, Kevin watched it all with a sickening lurch to his stomach that he’d never felt with any of the others.

Aaron and Nicky dragging Neil from the table and into the crowd only heightened the nausea, so Kevin finished off another drink and stood to follow, not knowing quite why.

Andrew’s hand on his sleeve tugged him back. Kevin met his look with a blink, which obviously did not impress his tiny bodyguard. “You aren’t planning on interfering, are you, Kevin? Because that would really ruin the whole point of this exercise.”

“What are you doing to him?”

“Finding out who exactly  _ Neil Josten _ is, Day. You want to know that, too. Don’t you?”

Kevin shrugged off Andrew’s fingers. “What do you think I’m going to do? Tell him not to tell you anything?”

Andrew’s mostly-sober glare was miles more terrifying than his drugged-up smile, especially since Kevin was rarely on the receiving end. But instead of letting the look freeze him in place, Kevin shoved down the fear, pulling away from the table towards where Neil had disappeared.

The crowd was densely packed, bouncing to the music, and Kevin hadn’t braved its center in a long time. But he caught sight of pale blond hair — Aaron in the crowd, then, behind him, Nicky, holding a limp Neil up before pushing him into the midst of the throng.

Kevin shadowed the stumbling figure, slipping from the cousins’ possible field of view. Neil hit the wall without the support of another person, his shoulder making a painful-looking impact with dark wood. He uselessly scrabbled at the surface to stay upright.

Kevin grabbed his elbow when he started sliding downwards, and Neil struck out at the touch, those strange blue eyes wild and over-dilated when he looked up at Kevin, barely seeing. His body was taut, his chest heaving.

“Don’t touch me,” he hissed when Kevin hauled him up, ignoring Neil’s fist in his ribs. The thump of the music and the chatter of the crowd behind them nearly drowned Neil out, but his voice was biting enough to cut through the noise.

Kevin tried not to feel guilty as Neil weakly shoved at him again. Neither Kevin’s attempt at gathering himself nor Neil’s attempt at pushing Kevin worked. “Neil, breathe.”

“What are you gonna do to me, huh?”

“Count you down?” Kevin asked, helplessly.

“You’re fucking kidding.”

Kevin grabbed Neil’s other arm when he started to list to the side and pressed him back into the wall, steadying him. “I’m not. Can you give me five?”

Neil’s laugh was sharp, mocking, short. “What, a high-five, champ?”

“Five things — you see,” Kevin clarified, only half certain.

“What if I just tell you to fuck off, Kevin?” Neil panted, but his fingers betrayed him, curling around Kevin’s forearms to hold himself up. Sweat stood out on his forehead, caught by the flash of a light for a moment.

“Tell me.”

“I see…the half-attached men’s bathroom sign. A spilled drink on the ground. These boots I’d like to kick you with. Your dumb club clothes. And I see…you. Your stupid face. Kind of. You’re too tall. Oh god.” Neil swayed again, tilting sideways. “Why’d you fucking drug me?”

“Andrew does it to new people. I didn’t… I thought about stopping him. I’m sorry.” The words tasted empty, ash in his mouth. It was too late now.

“But you didn’t,” Neil said, cold and furious. “So now here we are.”

Kevin guided him back to lean against the wall again, and Neil’s head swung back like he had no control over his neck anymore. “So why did Andrew drug me?”

He shouldn’t. That was why Andrew was doing this, right? To catch him off guard.

Neil was watching him process, eyes hooded, when Kevin met his gaze again. 

“To find out who you are,” Kevin said finally, and Neil’s reaction was as violent as the drugging one had been, shoving Kevin away as he jumped for an exit.

“Neil! Stop!”

Neil tripped over his own feet and several other occupants of the dance floor, and he was faintly trembling when Kevin scooped him up from where he’d fallen.

“Calm down. What are you touching?”

“Fuck you,” Neil snapped.

“You’re about to have a panic attack,” Kevin said, knowing because  _ he knew _ the untethered look in Neil’s eyes, he’d felt it himself. The shallow not-breaths, the shuddering of his frame under Kevin’s hands. It was all so horribly familiar. “It helps you, doesn’t it? The numbers. The focusing.”

“Hard to focus when…” Neil trailed off, forehead colliding with Kevin’s chest. “Shit.”

Kevin let Neil slump against him for endless moments, feeling awkwardly unsure of where to put his hands as his arms were very nearly wrapped entirely around his unsteady striker at this point. But then Neil spoke again, voice raggedly muffled in Kevin’s shirt.

“Shirt… your shirt. And —” his fingers tightened around where they were looped over Kevin’s bicep, gathering fabric. “Your jacket.” He seemed to struggle to inhale deeply, rolling back tense shoulders. “The wall. And the floor — the floor’s down there, but fuck, it’s spinning.”

“What about three?” Kevin asked. “Three things you can… can…” He couldn’t remember which one, but Neil supplied it for him, his voice ever so slightly slurring now.

“Hear. I can hear — the uh… the music. And that lady over there, talking about what a bitch her sister is. I can hear…” He paused, a hiccup of breath. “Your heartbeat. I’m the one panicking, you asshole, why are you so anxious?”

Kevin wanted to shove him away at that, because it wasn’t exactly anxiety that had his own heart thumping in his ears so loudly, but he wasn’t sure what to label it, and he sure wasn’t going to say shit to Neil about it.

“Should I leave you to count on your own til Andrew finds you?” he bit out instead, sharp and angry.

“Did he send you to find out everything?” Neil mumbled. “Figures he’d know I —”

He cut himself off, and Kevin thought that maybe he’d been about to actually find something out about the confusing mess that was Neil Josten, but Neil was peeling himself away from Kevin again, looking like he’d rather swallow his own tongue than continue, so Kevin nudged him back.

“Two.”

Neil wrinkled his nose. “Reeks of booze. And your cologne.” His eyes caught on Kevin’s, and the wrinkle migrated to between his eyebrows, as his eyelashes fluttered over blue, blue, blue. “How’d you find me, Kevin? How’d you… how’d you know? Why did you have to show up?”

“I followed Nicky and Aaron,” Kevin said, bemused, feeling like maybe he’d had too much too, because Neil wasn’t making any sense.

“You found me. You signed me. You showed up and said I could play.” Neil’s face crumpled. “I only ever wanted to play with you. But I shouldn’t. Why is it so easy for you to —”

His gaze slid in and out and the panic was back as he stared up at Kevin in silence, raising an unstable hand to his mouth. “Crackers,” he whispered. “Tastes like salt.” Then, with surprising strength, he was suddenly shoving Kevin away and running, footfalls uneven but too quick, and Neil Josten was gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> gotta b real y'all who comment about enjoying are the only reason i update,,, i lov u ;_;  
> i was going to wait to post this fic on tumblr until i finished it but i still haven't yet so if you'd like to support the fic further, reblogging [this new moodboard post](https://foxy-exy.tumblr.com/post/639274524771287040/sometimes-neil-josten-counting-kevin-through-a) for it would be v much appreciated!!


	4. [interlude part II — the house]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I know you."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: same as always, brief suicide mention, andrew being violent  
> Me, through tears: technically it’s 4+2 things i’m so sorry i’ve misled you all with a trope that kind of works for this story i just enjoy kevin figuring out how to comfort neil ok  
> 

[interlude part II — the house]

When Andrew found Kevin, shocked stock-still and sans Neil, he was visibly angry. Every minute they spent searching the club for the man turned Andrew’s glare deadlier. And when they’d finally stumbled out the doors to find an unmoving Neil lying unconscious next to the garbage bins, when a stranger looked up from where he was also observing Neil to call, “Do you know this guy? He paid me to knock him out,” well.

Kevin’s head slammed against the brick of Eden’s exterior wall when Andrew shoved him into it, face lit pale yellow in the streetlight, pupils blown wide from drugs that weren’t stretching any kind of smile across his mouth.

“What if I killed you now, Kevin?” Andrew asked, and indeed, one of his knives was at Kevin’s chest, pricking into skin. “Since you seem so fucking suicidal as to send this rabbit running before I can ask him absolutely anything.”

Kevin licked his lips, knowing a wrong move would mean bad things for his ability to breathe, quietly raised his hands. “He’s not a threat, Andrew. I promise.”

_ He hadn’t wanted Andrew to know who he was, he’d run the moment he’d started spilling whatever kind of strange secrets those had been, but… _

_ He wasn’t a threat. _

Andrew yanked Kevin’s jacket collar tight, pulling him down too close to stare, then threw him towards Neil’s prone form, hissing, “Your own funeral, Day. I want nothing to do with you or your idiot striker.”

So Kevin gathered Neil up, alone, carried him to the car, alone, and when Andrew, with Nicky and Aaron in tow, finally showed up to drive home, there wasn’t so much as a glance in his direction.

Aaron blinked incredulously at them, and Nicky babbled with concern until Kevin snapped what had happened, but Andrew remained stonily silent during the drive, as he unlocked the Columbia house door, as he continued on upstairs to his room, until the door closed behind him.

“Dumbass,” Aaron said, vanishing into his own room.

“I can take him,” Nicky said, very much not vanishing into his own room.

“I’ve got him,” Kevin said, ducking Nicky’s interested gaze, dumped Neil onto the couch where he usually slept, and, after a moment, went to find a trash can to leave next to him.

Kevin slept on the floor.

* * *

Neil the next morning was equally panicked, and angry besides, but his cracker hangover seemed to have halted his immediate running for the hills in favor of hiding and biding his time.

Kevin had returned from his morning trip to the kitchen armed with water, had reached to gently shake Neil’s shoulder, thinking Neil was still asleep. But before his fingers even made contact, Neil spat, “Don’t touch me, Kevin.”

“You need to hydrate.”

Neil’s furious eyes turning on him was a shock, and Kevin had blurted out, “You’re wearing brown contacts again,” without thinking about it.

Neil balled up at that, limbs drawing inward, as he scuttled back into the corner of the couch, as far from Kevin as he could.

“Neil.”

Neil stilled.

“I didn’t say anything to Andrew.”

“Anything about  _ what _ ,” Neil ground out, like each word caused him pain.

“About how you ran. About what you said.”

“Why wouldn’t you? You two are attached at the fucking hip, anyway, why wouldn’t you just hand me over?”

“You know me.”

Neil laughed, but it sounded like it tore him open. “Who doesn’t know you?”

“I know you.”

The laugh cut, and Neil’s brown eyes went empty as he shook against the couch cushions.

“Your eyes. I know them. Were you…” Kevin felt the uncertain prickle of deja vu again, the flash of familiar dark walls in his memory. “Were you part of the Ravens?”

“No,” Neil said, and said, “I can’t breathe.”

Kevin knelt down by the couch and said, “Five things you can see.”

Neil started mumbling to himself, lens-covered eyes flicking in and out of focus as he tried to capture things around the room, and Kevin continued to puzzle as he stared.

“Four,” he said when Neil’s lips went slack and silent. “You were at the Nest. You  _ were. _ ”

Neil squeezed his eyes shut and clenched his fingers around fistfuls of his blanket, muttering again.

“You played with us,” Kevin murmured. “What can you hear?”

“You, you, you need to shut up.” Neil pitched forward to press his face into the pillow, shaking his head.

“And two things you smell,” Kevin continued. “You were there because…”

“One thing,” Nathaniel Wesninski, the man who was supposed to be number 3, said quietly as he looked up to Kevin’s horrified face. “Can I have that water now?”


	5. [the studio]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You count me down an awful lot for someone who hates me, Neil Josten.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My instagram followers voted for this fic to be the one i focused on next and goddammit i'm surprised but glad  
> Happy birthday kev,,,i fought long and hard to get this out today though it just kept getting longer and painfully longer,,, and happy late/extra early birthday to neil bc i hoped and wildly failed to get this out for his (actual) bday rip (luckily the man has two)  
> I love how i started this fic like “i’ll write lil panic attack scenes in different places that can stand on their own with the briefest transition bits between them” and now we’re here where the actual scenes in question are a small portion of a much larger chapter than anticipated,,, anyway  
> CW: usual warnings, Riko Moriyama's presence, mentions of previous drugging, light blood, also i wrote the panic attack while i was dissociating and feeling real bad so,,, might be a lil wilder than usual oops

[the studio]

It took Kevin a while to think about it, to attempt to rationalize it, to dip even a toe into coming to terms with it. Neil Josten would have been Nathaniel, a Raven alongside him — part of the Perfect Court, another Riko plaything, another legend in the making. And now here he was, a Fox, signed under Kevin.

The Butcher’s son, come to roost in what should have been Kevin’s safe haven, and suddenly, Nathaniel’s presence carried with it the familiar terror that Kevin had become old friends with, humming through his bones. Kevin looked away when Nathaniel caught his gaze, didn’t respond when he spoke, left the room when he entered it.

Eventually, Nathaniel stopped looking at him.

The days edged onward and Andrew spent an irritating amount of time laughing at the sudden distance between Kevin and his “mini-me,” the upperclassmen started to freeze them out after Nathaniel had spilled the bare bones basics of what had happened at Eden’s, and at practice, the team’s fractured state showed worse than ever.

Kevin stared at the giant red FIRST GAME DAY written on the calendar, creeping closer and closer, and his hand itched for his racquet, his brain replaying over and over the last time he’d tried to coach Nathaniel alone on the court — they hadn’t gotten far enough. It was that thought that finally pulled him from his dorm late one night, unease prickling up his spine.

Nathaniel didn’t open the door when Kevin banged on it, because they needed to fucking practice or they truly stood no chance. Instead, a cold-faced Matt and a tiredly pissed Seth greeted him.

“Where is —”

“Get the fuck out of here,” Seth growled.

“He doesn’t want to see you, asshole,” Matt snapped.

“We have to practice!”

“Should have thought of that before you _drugged him_ ,” Matt spat.

Seth started forward like he thought Kevin’s face perhaps looked like a nice target for his fist, but a hand in the middle of Seth’s chest and then Matt physically pushing him back stopped him.

The hand belonged to... _him_.

Nathaniel looked small, in the middle of all of them, but even hidden behind false color, his eyes snapped sharp and fierce when he turned to look at Kevin.

“I’ll give you five minutes.”

* * *

“We both need to practice. The season is going to start. It’s time to get over…all this.” Kevin’s gesture was too big and awkwardly trailed off at the end, his fingers curling as he recognized too late the emotions pouring off Nathaniel.

“ _That’s_ how you’re planning on doing this?”

Kevin wondered how he could have mistaken him before for anyone else — Nathaniel’s expression now is nothing but Wesninski. Cold, dead fury.

“You’re going to brush it aside like you didn’t freak out and then pretend I didn’t exist?” The step forward shouldn’t have sent Kevin skittering back, and the smile that curled across Nathaniel’s face definitely shouldn’t have been as broken as it was. “Like you aren’t still fucking terrified of me?”

Kevin set his jaw and fought the impulse that urged him back even further. “We’ll figure it out. The game is most important, Nathaniel.”

“ _Don’t_ call me that,” snarled the striker, and Kevin flinched. Nathaniel — _Neil_ — stared at him, disgust clear in his face as he looked Kevin up and down, and finally looked away. He was quiet when he spoke again. “And what about me? What if I don’t want to ‘figure it out’ with you?”

Kevin felt dangerously unstable suddenly. “What, are you going to quit?”

“And what would you care if I did, Kevin?”

No, no, that wasn’t how this was supposed to go. Neil couldn’t leave. Kevin had hand picked him, had sat there watching those tapes every night to be sure that he was _the one_ , electric with his potential. A Fox who might be able to make it past a shattered past to what the game was really about, someone who might even want it as badly as he did, and he was going to _walk away from it?_

Kevin started towards him, angry now. “Why would you sign with me if you weren’t going to play for me?”

“Why would you drop me if you wanted me to play?!” Neil bit back.

Kevin stabbed a finger into Neil’s chest — they were too close now, Neil’s teeth bared, Kevin’s lungs tight — and the words hurt as they tore their way out. “You could _be something_ if you fucking tried.”

“Then _make me_!”

Neil’s voice broke halfway through, and Kevin’s anger cracked and crumbled.

“ _Make me_ into something.” Neil’s head dropped, defeat sagging through his frame. “I didn’t lie when I said I just wanted to play with you. I’m not real. But on the court… playing Exy… maybe I could pretend to be. You make me want to be.”

“Neil.”

Neil looked up, and Kevin needed to see determination in his eyes again, instead of dire hopelessness. He held out his hand — the left one that he’d had shattered at the Nest, what he had to fight every day against.

“I can’t make you into anything if you don’t try. Play with me. Give your game to me.”

Neil stared at his fingers, lips parted, took a shuddery breath, and finally, finally placed his own hand in Kevin’s, looking up at him once more. “Okay.”

* * *

It was surprisingly easy to slide back into practice with Neil, to correct his grip and toss out tips on his shots. To begin to look forward to each night because it meant practice with Neil and Neil alone.

It didn’t mean anything that watching Neil improve at an enviable pace, honing his aim and strength, running himself into the ground for the game — it all sparked something behind Kevin’s ribs. It wasn’t something when Neil would stumble off the court at ridiculous hours of the night, combing back sweat-soaked hair, and smile an exhausted, satisfied smile at Kevin — and Kevin couldn’t breathe in a way that wasn’t anything like panic.

And during the day, when a practice scrimmage had Neil trapped by defense, until he frantically searched for and found Kevin, until he slammed the ball into Kevin’s net, and Kevin brought the ball home, lighting the goal red, a perfect assist. Well. It meant absolutely nothing that Neil bowling into him with a grin afterwards had Kevin’s mouth dry and his heart pounding.

Their practices were nowhere near where they needed to be as they hurtled toward the first game of the season, Kevin’s debut, Neil’s. The Foxes’ possible start as a team worth watching for once in their miserable time spent existing. Kevin wasn’t optimistic for their chances at the moment, but maybe they would get there one of these games.

“We have to do press.”

Wymack’s respect for Kevin’s experience and Kevin’s time spent as an assistant coach still bled into their handling of the team. So when Wymack slid his computer Kevin’s way across his desk one morning, Kevin gamely scanned the screen of emails, setting aside his folders about upcoming opponents.

“They all want to interview me.” It wasn’t a question. Each title line, each preview was stamped with “KEVIN DAY,” “INTERVIEW WITH NUMBER TWO,” “RAVEN TURNED FOX…” The thought of talking his way around the inevitable questions about his ex partner, his old team — Kevin could barely swallow down nausea.

“You can hold off, if you want.” Wymack tapped a pen against the screen, an email from _The Kathy Ferdinand Show_. “If we give them first exclusive, Kathy has agreed to wait until after we face Breckenridge. It’ll give you a bit more time.”

 _A bit more time._ Kevin tried not to crumple the Trojans’ profile between his hands. “I’ll do it. Forward me the email, I can respond directly. I’ve done Kathy’s show before, I know her.”

“I can ask someone else to appear with you, Kevin. It doesn’t all have to be about the Ravens.”

Kevin met his coach’s — his unknowing _father’s_ — gruffly concerned gaze. It was maybe touching, that Wymack was worried about him. As touching as David Wymack could be to Kevin Day, emotion-allergic as the pair of them could be. “Maybe. I’ll… I’ll think about it. I’ll talk to her team.” Then, awkwardly tacked on, “Thank you.”

He gathered his folders to his chest as Wymack nodded and pointedly turned his attention back to his computer, ignoring him once more as Kevin headed for the door, thinking of an almost-Raven. An almost-Raven maybe appearing on Kathy’s show too. After all, this would be his career, as well. It could be a good move for him to come.

Yes. An almost-Raven, keeping Kevin’s panic in check, sitting beside him on that couch.

* * *

They lost the Breckenridge game. It was expected. It was still maddening.

The Jackals exploited the holes in their line, their flaws, their weaknesses. And most infuriatingly, they played on Kevin’s own fear. Gorilla went for his hand, again and again, and Kevin bent each time in fear of breaking.

So they lost, and Kevin took a moment to mourn.

But whatever. Ultimately, it didn’t matter. Because they would win, soon enough.

And there was an interview to brave the next morning.

* * *

Kevin felt like a zombie as he strapped his wrist braces in place the morning after the game, feeling the phantom burn of the racquet strikes alongside the slight unreality that came with a sleepless night. Andrew had spent the night kicking him each time he nodded off, and when Aaron was forced into consciousness by his twin as well, he ended up yanking Kevin by the foot from his beanbag safe haven at dawn in retaliation.

Though he slept for some of the bus ride, Wymack joined the party by pulling Kevin from his seat and smacking the back of his head before sending him on laps, and that summed up much of the rest of the trip.

* * *

It wasn’t until Kathy had zeroed in on Neil and Neil’s expression closed off in uncomfortable, barely-masked terror that Kevin realized he maybe should have said something to Neil before this. It was too late now, so he’d have to soldier on.

“I want you on my show this morning,” Kathy said.

“Kevin says you’re going to sign with the US Court after graduation,” Kathy said.

“You can’t spend this season running from the press when you’re playing with Kevin Day,” Kathy said.

“Kevin, you understand, don’t you?” Kathy said.

Kevin smiled at her, nodded, steeled himself, and turned to Neil, who was glaring at him with all the malice he could muster.

“It’s not your decision,” Neil spat in French.

“You should do this,” Kevin said, in the same language. “You’re meant for Court. Even with your past, this is an opportunity. Come with me, Neil.”

“I can’t be on TV. They’ll find out who I am. Kevin, they’ll know.”

“You already were on TV. This is a chance to establish Neil Josten, striker of the Foxes. Dazzle them with the name you’ve chosen, and they won’t care to look for the one you left behind. This is about your future. Did you want me to make you into something or not?”

“But this isn’t — I don’t want —”

“You gave your game to me. _Did you mean it or did you not?_ ” Kevin asked.

Neil could only mouth unvoiced words, looking painfully torn. Scared to reach out and grab what he was being offered because all he knew was running. Unsure if he could stand on his own and stand up to the true scrutiny of the public, if he could manage forging his own path.

Kevin understood. Kevin knew exactly what that look was. He saw it in the mirror every day.

“It’s settled,” he finally said, turning to Kathy, and Neil’s jaw tightened, but he didn’t contradict Kevin.

* * *

Their dressing room was small, and Neil looked increasingly uncomfortable, still tense and angry as Kevin picked out clothes for him from the selection.

Neil swapped into them as quickly as possible, ridiculously avoiding showing skin, which Kevin sighed at as he changed into his own outfit easily. The silence was awkward, their previous discord still apparent.

“Why did you say that?” Neil asked finally, as he peered at his brown contacts in the mirror, tugged at his hair.

“Say what?”

“Why did you say I would make Court?”

“Did you think I didn’t believe you could make it? Why would I choose a new addition to the team that I thought would go nowhere? Why would I offer my help to someone without any talent? You have potential.” Kevin crossed his arms as Neil turned, blinked, and looked like his world might be imploding. “So what are you going to tell Kathy?”

“That I hate you.”

“You don’t.”

“How would you know?”

Kevin stepped close to hold up his five fingers to Neil, who stiffened, attention snapping up to Kevin’s face. “You count me down an awful lot for someone who hates me, Neil Josten.”

* * *

The interview was supposed to be nothing, a mere stepping stone in the game of public relations, a place to represent his team and his sport. Maybe there would be some tough questions about his old team, but Kevin had prepared. Neil was right there next to him, fighting his own fear. They would face it all together.

Kevin didn’t know that there was no preparation for what Kathy had planned.

The music of the Ravens felt like a direct punch to the chest, and the appearance of another guest from the wings was the finishing blow.

Riko Moriyama’s hug was a promise of pain to come, and Kevin did not know what Riko said, and did not know what he said in response as they both sat down.

Through the eerie buzz of silence Kevin’s ears laid over the scene, he was almost certain he was about to pass out. He was shaking, trembling like a leaf, the studio was no more, it was simply… _him_ , sitting across from Kevin, the man he’d been ready to give his all to, to serve, to support, who he’d lived for and who he’d have died for. And Riko was sitting there and smiling and his eyes said that he was going to hurt Kevin again, worse than before, he was going to _destroy_ him, and Kevin would sit there and take it because Kevin would always be number 2 to his 1.

He thought that he could not think anymore, that everything felt sped up and also fed through a dreamy filter of wrong, and perhaps he would simply shatter apart here on the stage.

Feeling trickled through, on his thigh, a hand, five fingers, tap-tap-tapping one at a time, fingerprints embedding into his flesh as they pressed harder down each pass, and Kevin broke the empty stare of Riko to turn, to look at Neil Josten’s hand.

A brush of hair on his cheek, a brown curl that should have been should have been should have been red. In his ear, a warm breath whispering, “Count down with me?” Neil leaning in close, so close, an anchor when Kevin was drowning.

Again, the fingers tapped, 1-2-3-4-5. Slower, more deliberately.

 _Five._ Neil’s hand, smaller than his, fingernails bitten down to nothing, tapping away at the fabric of Kevin’s pants leg. _Four._ His own hands, rubbing over each other feverishly, reworking old wounds and aches and gashes of flesh. _Three._ Kathy, grin still in place, simpering over them all, voice chipper and grating even through watery echoes. _Two._ The studio, the audience, the chilly air of the whole place smelling faintly of cleaner, lightly of nauseatingly sweet perfume. _One_. He was chewing on his lip, a worry at the skin that burst it into a sharp pain, iron on his tongue, and he reached to wipe at it and his fingers came away smeared with drops of red.

He’d mashed the numbers, the count all together, while he was robotically making false conversation, but it didn’t matter as Neil’s fingers tightened once more on him, no longer a tap but a squeeze as he leaned around Kevin to spit words that faded in and out, that should have terrified Kevin. None of it mattered, because he was pulling himself up the rope that Neil had tossed him with each number. Neil’s presence at his side had inched closer, was now pressed solidly against him, knee to shoulder, was making him real again. Neil’s bite of language was turning Kevin corporeal, tearing away the veil.

When Neil’s fingers wrapped around Kevin’s hand and squeezed like a death grip, the haze cracked and broke. Sound reached him again.

“I am not scared of Kevin,” said Riko coldly. “I know him.”

“You’re going to eat those words,” smiled Neil, his eyes carrying a feral crazed glint. “You’re going to choke on them.”

Kevin swallowed and squeezed Neil’s hand back, and Neil’s gaze darted to meet his as he tapped each finger once more against Kevin’s knuckles. Kevin let himself nod, almost imperceptibly, and in response, Neil’s mouth twitched ever so slightly, in something like satisfaction.

Kathy’s voice faded back into Kevin’s periphery of attention, her tone one of closing the segment: “…Orange or black, Kevin? What color is your future?”

Kevin didn’t tear his eyes from Neil. “I am staying at Palmetto,” he said. “I’m staying as long as they’ll have me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One (?) more chap boys 👀👀👀  
> (im sorry kevin you deserved a happier bday present but next chapter is All Soft Time i promise)

**Author's Note:**

> chat to me abt aftg on tumblr @ [foxy-exy](https://foxy-exy.tumblr.com/) or check out links to my other socials with cosplay & other content in [my carrd here](https://kayizcray.carrd.co/)!  
> -  
> comments keep me goin, please please do leave em n i'll adore you  
> 


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